Quite a few years ago we decided to dress up our jets with new paint
jobs and the radome was included. Nice, black, and glossy, the radome
looked real nice against the new paint job. Then we started getting
complaints from the aircrews that the radar wasn't getting distant
contacts like it used to. We checked the receivers of the jets that
were being written up but found they were were seeing as well as they
ever did. For the nuts of it we did a radome off /on test and found the
source of the problem.... it was the paint that was attenuating the
signal and by several db. We had the paint stripped and confirmed that
was the source of the problem. The paint was a good quality paint, it
had to be to stay on the nose as well as it did. As I recall, the paint
shop contacted the depot and found out what was recommended and obtained
the correct stuff. Now I know paint has come a long way since those
days and the frequency was considerably higher but it makes me still
question if painting the fiberglass is a good idea unless you know for
sure the paint won't cause some attenuation.
Open for comments... 73
Dick, N0IM
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Dick Bodine
mailto:rbodine@cpinternet.com
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